environmental Archives - The Paper and Paperboard Packaging Environmental Council (PPEC)

Archive for environmental

Article Overlooks the Importance of Recycled Content

Posted by Rachel Kagan

· December 5, 2022

In the November 28_^th New York Times Magazine article, Where Does All the Cardboard Come From? I Had to Know, writer Matthew Shaer does a deep dive on what he refers to as the “cardboard economy” – everything from the history of who invented it, how it’s made, and its global marketplace.

Image adapted from The New York Times Magazine

First off, to us at PPEC, while “cardboard” is a commonly used term that we all understand – the box our deliveries come in – the industry terms are a bit different.

A corrugated box is made from strong paper fibres, comprising a top and bottom layer of paper fibre known as linerboard, and a middle layer, called corrugating medium, which is the wavy part that gives the box its strength.

Image of linerboard corrugating medium

While a boxboard or paperboard carton typically only holds a single item – i.e. cereal or shoes – it does not require the same strength properties as a corrugated box, so you won’t see any wavy ripples in those.

But back to the article. While it is mostly focused on the scale and size of the international market for corrugated packaging – which is expected to reach an estimated $205 billion by 2025, according to the article – it does refer to some of the environmental attributes of corrugated packaging, noting that it is “more recyclable than other shipping methods,” and even likens it to a classic fairy tale:

“Corrugated packaging has a Goldilocks quality to it,” says Tim Cooper, a project director for the
market-research and testing firm Smithers. “It’s easy to produce, it’s strong and it’s sustainable,
because unlike plastic, it comes from a renewable resource.”

We agree that it is strong and sustainable, but there is nothing fictional about the environmental sustainability of corrugated packaging. What Goldilocks needs to understand is that not only is it recyclable, it is actually and actively recycled, allowing it to be reused again and again.

Using recycled content is an inherent part of the Canadian paper packaging industry’s operations. PPEC member mills have been using recycled paper fibres for decades. It makes environmental and business sense to recycle and reuse old paper packaging, including Old Corrugated Cardboard, so it can be remade into new paper-based packaging products again and again, keeping valuable raw material out of landfill.

While the New York Times article reports on its high recycling rates in the U.S., it does not discuss the importance of recycled content, making it sound like boxes are made mostly from trees.

In fact, trees are mentioned in the article 16 times, while recycling is mentioned 11 times.

The sustainable management of forests, and what happens after consumers and businesses recycle their boxes is not mentioned, which may perpetuate the myth that paper-based packaging primarily uses trees in the manufacturing process, which is simply untrue.

In Canada, the average recycled content for domestic shipments of containerboard, which is used to make corrugated boxes is 86.5%, and nearly 80% for boxboard, according to PPEC’s Recycled Content Survey.

The remaining materials used in the mix include sawmill residues and some virgin fibres from responsibly sourced forests. But to be clear, the Canadian paper packaging industry doesn’t use much in the way of freshly cut trees, and the little that is harvested must be successfully regenerated by law. In 2019, the total forest harvest (for lumber and all paper grades including packaging) represented 0.2% of Canada’s forest land, according to The State of Canada’s Forests Annual Report.

We don’t take issue with the New York Times article itself, it is a well-researched piece on what has become a preferred packaging choice, and we expect there will be a continued shift towards paper-based packaging, especially as governments consider banning some types of materials, similar to Canada’s ban on single-use plastics.

But, articles like this should also talk about the critical role that recycling plays in the sustainability of the paper packaging industry. That must be part of any story about corrugated and paper-based packaging because it is an inherent part of our industry’s story.

When we use and recycle paper-based packaging, we all play a part in protecting and replenishing our renewable resources, contributing to the sustainable management of Canada’s forests, and supporting the circular economy of the paper-based packaging industry through the important act of recycling.

Rachel Kagan

Executive Director Paper & Paperboard Packaging Environmental Council (PPEC)

Statistics Canada’s New Waste Management Survey Results: Paper Represents 35% of Diversion

Posted by Rachel Kagan

· November 18, 2022

· No Comments

On November 15, 2022, Statistics Canada released the results of its biennial Waste Management Survey, containing waste diversion data for 2020, broken down by material type and diversion source (residential and non-residential).

The new data shows that Canadian households and businesses diverted 9,903,027 tonnes of waste in 2020, and of the total amount diverted, 3,502,683 tonnes were paper fibres (which includes newsprint, cardboard and boxboard, and mixed paper), representing 35% of the total amount diverted in 2020.

While paper diversion represents the majority of materials diverted from landfill in Canada, paper diversion has been trending slightly downward year over year since 2014, which could be partly attributed to the continued decline of newsprint materials due to the shift from print to digital.

The next leading category of materials diverted in Canada for 2020 was organics with 32% of the total share of diversion.

Digging deeper into the paper diversion data, of the 3.5 million total tonnes diverted in Canada in 2020, about 44% was diverted through residential sources (ie. Blue Box residential municipal recycling programs), while the remaining 56% was diverted through non-residential sources (ie. Industrial Commercial and Institutional (IC&I) collection).

Below is a breakdown of the sources of paper diversion by province, with the two most populous provinces, Ontario and Quebec, diverting the most paper fibre from both residential and non-residential (IC&I) sources.

Of the other 33% of diverted materials, Statistics Canada reported that “diverting plastic waste to avoid its disposal has become a challenge because of the many types of hard-to-recycle plastics being produced for consumption and entering the waste stream.” Of the 9.9 million total tonnes of waste materials diverted in Canada in 2020, 368,343 tonnes of plastics, or about 3.7%, were diverted.

The Government of Canada has been working to address plastic waste as part of its Zero Plastic Waste Agenda. PPEC continues to monitor government and industry activities related to plastics and we recently wrote about how Canada’s new ban on single-use plastics may impact the paper packaging industry. And while the plastics industry is looking to create a circular economy for its materials through various initiatives, including the Canada Plastics Pact, the paper packaging industry has long held a large-scale circular economy for its materials.

Using recycled materials is an inherent part of our members’ operations. For decades PPEC members have used recycled paper materials as its primary feedstock in making the three major paper packaging grades in Canada (containerboard, boxboard, and kraft paper). They use old corrugated cardboard and other paper-based materials, collected from the backs of factories, supermarkets, office buildings, and from residential recycling programs to make new paper-based packaging.

PPEC’s membership represents several different components of our industry’s recycling supply chain, not just as providers of recyclable paper-based packaging, but also as processors of collected paper materials, and as mills who are recycling and reusing the collected materials, which allows them to be remade into new paper packaging products again and again, keeping valuable raw material out of landfill.

Rachel Kagan

Executive Director Paper & Paperboard Packaging Environmental Council (PPEC)

Little Green Lies: Q&A with Author John Mullinder

Posted by Rachel Kagan

· June 6, 2022

· No Comments

The Paper and Paperboard Packaging Environmental Council (PPEC) sat down with its former and long-standing Executive Director, John Mullinder, who helped formed PPEC in 1990, and retired in February 2021.

John recently published his new book, Little Green Lies and Other BS, which focuses on environmental claims and advertising; it is a follow up to his first book, Deforestation in Canada and Other Fake News, published in 2018.

Little Green Lies is well researched and organized, covering about 40 different subjects in alphabetical order from “Ancient” Forests to “Zero” Waste.

PPEC chatted with John about his new book, and excerpts from our conversation follow, edited for length.

Hi John! Can you please give our readers a brief description of your new book and why you wrote it?

One of my reviewers described it as “an entertaining and informative dictionary of environmental buzzwords (and claims) that are widely used (or made) but often poorly understood.” The book examines those buzzwords, what they mean and whether the current use of these terms is accurate, misleading, confusing, deceptive or just plain wrong, and includes 38 pages of sources for the information (that’s the dictionary part).

I wrote it because there is so much misinformation, and sometimes deliberate greenwash, about these buzzwords and claims, and I want to set the record straight.

What can readers hope to learn from this book?

Not to accept all environmental claims as apple pie. To question the use of particular buzzwords. To understand and analyse the context in which claims are made, whether they are made by businesses, governments, or environmental groups. And to avoid making those same claims themselves.

The book doubles as an educational tool for staff, customers, journalists, policy advisers.

Or as one of my reviewers wrote: “This is a great reference book that will help you sort the facts from the fiction. If you’re a writer, editor, public relations professional, legislator, educator, work for an NGO, or are simply a consumer who wants to know the truth, this book should be on your shelf or Kindle list.”

What can people expect to learn from reading Little Green Lies (image)

How does this book differ from your first book, Deforestation in Canada and Other Fake News?

The focus of “Deforestation in Canada and Other Fake News” was to debunk two commonly-held myths: that Canada is running out of trees, and that massive deforestation is taking place in our own backyard. Both not true.

While “Little Green Lies” does cover these issues as well, it is far broader, examining a wide range of forestry and paper issues, packaging, recycling, and waste. It is also more international, incorporating as much global and US data and perspectives as possible, not just Canadian data.

There are a lot of misconceptions when it comes to forestry – particularly related to deforestation and “ancient” forests – where does the confusion come from, and how do we address it?

There is widespread confusion about each of these because people work to different definitions of them. And the media makes it worse by not explaining what the terms mean and/or misapplying the meaning of the words. We (and I mean collectively) need to develop broadly agreed-upon definitions that we can all work to, and to publicize them widely, especially to journalists. The United Nations, for example, has a very clear definition of deforestation.

With increased activity and attention on corporate greenwashing — the practice of making false or misleading environmental sustainability claims — and with the Competition Bureau of Canada archiving its Environmental Claims Guide, do you believe there are enough resources available to provide clarity on claims and misleading marketing practices?

Absolutely not. And even the advice that is out there (the archived guidelines you refer to) are inadequate. This is one of the reasons they were archived as a matter of fact. Greenwashing is a major issue and it needs sufficient resources allocated to it, urgently. Or nobody will believe anything. And that is a slippery slope.

PPEC has long called for disposal bans on paper-based packaging, considering such materials are recyclable and end markets exist; why do you think there is resistance to implementing such bans?

What really gets up my nose are provinces spouting off about how we should all move to a circular economy while they do little or nothing to change the economics that make it cheaper to send stuff to landfill rather than to recycle it.

The circular economy is all about reusing materials again and again, and the provinces have the power to do something about this. They need to demonstrate some political fortitude and be willing to take on the commercial interests of municipalities and waste haulers who happen to own landfills.

Ban old boxes from landfills, says paper industry

Do you have any comments on the state of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) policies and legislation in Canada as they relate to the paper-based packaging industry? And how does the consumer/resident – who ultimately decides how to dispose of their waste and recyclables – fit into the concept of EPR?

I think we have to be very careful in claiming EPR as the solution for materials ending up in landfill. Any costs that producers incur through EPR schemes will inevitably be passed on to consumers. What’s important for industry (including the paper industry) is that any fee structure be fair and evenly applied. Non-performers must be penalized for any scheme to work.

And a major education job is required to get the consumer in the loop. For example, about 40% of Ontario Blue Box recyclables go straight to the trash because householders are confused about whether certain materials are recyclable or not. Much (but not all) of this trashed material is perfectly recyclable.

Is there anything else you would like to share about your new book Little Green Lies?

I know this will sound a bit like a sales pitch (it is!), but I think the book provides a sound basis for critically examining many of the environmental claims we see and hear today (whether they are from industry, governments, or environmental groups). The sources for the information I provide are all there. Facts do matter.

Rachel Kagan

Executive Director Paper & Paperboard Packaging Environmental Council (PPEC)

Recycled content must be recognised in setting circular economy targets

Posted by John Mullinder

· October 19, 2017

· 2 Comments

The Ontario Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MOECC) is in the process of considering what it calls specific material “management” targets for Ontario Blue Box recyclables such as paper, plastic, glass, steel and aluminum. It has already stated that it wants to see a collective 75% Blue Box diversion rate, up from the current 64 per cent.

But before we get into the details of specific targets for materials, there’s a major issue that we need to address that has everything to do with the circular economy that the minister and the province say they want to embrace. And that’s the issue of recycled content. The use of recycled content keeps materials flowing around in a circular loop for as long as possible.

Most corrugated boxes and boxboard cartons made in Ontario, for example, are already 100% recycled content: made from used boxes and paper collected from the back of factories and supermarkets, from offices and hospitals, and from curbside (Blue Box) collection and depots. The Ontario paper packaging industry achieved this milestone over many years with the expenditure of millions of dollars in new cleaning and screening equipment. Indeed, the mills of Southern Ontario led North America in incorporating residentially collected old boxboard into their recycling mix back in the 1990s. Today some 94% of Canadians can recycle it.

The industry’s environmental council, PPEC, has been very public in tracking and reporting on the industry’s progress towards a more circular economy. But now its members find themselves competing in the marketplace against virgin materials that have made minimal or little progress towards higher recycled content or “circularity.”

The plastics industry, for example, does not publish any numbers on average recycled content that we can find, and plastics’ overall Blue Box diversion rate is frankly poor (32%). Plastic film diversion has gone from 6% to 12% over the last 13 years, and polystyrene from 3% to 6% over the same period.

If we are going to have a level playing field between materials, we need public policy that encourages the greater use of recycled content and/or some recognition of recycled content achievement in the Blue Box funding formula and/or performance targets. We don’t see it at the moment, and yet paper packaging faces increasing competition from cheaper virgin plastics. How about the province set a target of 40% average recycled content for all packaging sold within Ontario by 2020 and 70% by 2027 ? That would put us on the path to a more circular economy and create a more level playing field at the same time.

John Mullinder

2 Comments

Categories : Blue Box, Paper Packaging, Paper Recycling

Tags : Blue Box, Corrugated boxes, environmental, labelling, waste diversion

Circular Economy or spinning our wheels?

Posted by John Mullinder

· August 15, 2017

· No Comments

The Circular Economy (CE to some) has become something of a buzzword of late, just like sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) before it. Good intentions, but a lot of public relations too. Perhaps we’re being too cynical, but the issue is a bit like climate change. We know it’s coming (most of us) or is already here. But we really don’t want to have fewer children, abandon our cars, or go vegetarian: three actions a research scientist recently claimed would have more direct impact on slowing climate change than anything else we can do. We would add planting trees to that list.

The Circular Economy is really about the same thing as climate change: reducing our consumption of the earth’s various resources by using less of them, in a smarter way. But to do that we need to incent “good” behaviour and to penalise “bad,” which is generally taken to mean removing or reducing fossil fuel subsidies and encouraging the use of renewable resources.

This is fine at the academic level but how exactly is this going to translate in practical terms to say, the Blue Box system? Where consumers face a spur of the moment choice to recycle or dump? How do we penalise the “non-circular” products and packaging, while encouraging the “circular”? Through differentiated Blue Box fees? And who gets to decide those?

Now for the plug! PPEC will be holding a seminar on this very subject on October 3 in Etobicoke, Ontario. The speakers include Chris Lindberg (Ontario Circular Economy Innovation Lab), Glenda Gies (Resource Productivity and Recovery Authority), Andrew Telfer (Walmart Canada), Renee Dello (City of Toronto) and Al Metauro (Cascades Recovery). For details and registration click here. This is a limited space event and we always fill up quickly.

John Mullinder

No Comments

Categories : Paper Packaging, Waste Diversion, Waste Strategy

Tags : Blue Box, Corrugated boxes, environmental, Paper Recycling, waste diversion

China doesn’t want the world’s garbage any more

Posted by John Mullinder

· July 26, 2017

· 2 Comments

And who can blame them? For years, the world has been shipping all sorts of waste to China for it to be sorted, made into new products, and shipped back to us. Low labour rates and lax environmental enforcement have benefitted all parties to this commercial deal (even perhaps the Chinese workers, a job being better than no job).

One of the first warning signs of impending change occurred in 2013 when China launched “Operation Green Fence” to limit imports of scrap materials. Unscrupulous people were sending more garbage than resources. This was followed by the more recent “National Sword” crackdown on smuggling operations. Then last week, China shocked the global recycling industry with the announcement of a scrap import ban effective the end of this year.

“To protect China’s environmental interests and the people’s health, we urgently adjust the imported solid wastes list, and forbid the import of solid wastes that are highly polluted” read China’s filing of intent with the World Trade Organisation. Details were scarce beyond general statements about multiple plastics, mixed paper, textiles, and other materials. But the impact of the announcement itself has been significant.

The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) called the new move potentially “devastating” and “catastrophic” for the US recycling industry. The Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) labelled the new policy as “serious” and wants more time before it comes into effect.

For Canadians involved in the international recovered paper trade, the challenge is that no one yet fully understands exactly what will be banned. The wording that is being used is “unsorted paper” and “mixed plastics.” If this is taken literally then most of the Canadian paper fibre currently being exported to China will not be impacted. The Green by Nature consortium that handles British Columbia’s Blue Box materials, for example, sorts all residential paper and does not ship single stream (or mixed) unsorted material to the republic.

“If this is not acceptable,” says consortium partner Al Metauro, CEO of Cascades Recovery, “then we will have a challenge. The challenge will not be on the curbside fibre but rather on the demand for old corrugated containers (OCC). The Chinese mills rely on imports and with no curbside fibre they will need an alternative. On the other hand, the Chinese government could also ban imports of OCC considering some of the poor quality being shipped.”

Metauro says a ban on “mixed plastics” will impact material recovery facility (MRF) operators that are not sorting their plastic, glass and metal recyclables (the container stream). This will be a bigger challenge in the US, he says, where many program operators are currently shipping commingled single stream material direct to China. In British Columbia, by contrast, all residential plastics are sorted and consumed locally.

John Mullinder

2 Comments

Categories : Corrugated Boxes, Paper Packaging, Paper Recycling

Tags : china, environmental, garbage, landfill, OCC, Paper Recycling, Recovery rates

Canada diverting only 27% of its waste

Posted by John Mullinder

· April 24, 2017

· No Comments

For those promoting a more circular economy where materials are used again and again rather than made, used and dumped, the latest data from Statistics Canada provides a solid gut check on how far we have to go. Only 27% of our waste is currently being diverted from landfill or incineration. The “good” news is that at least our diversion rate has been steadily improving, up from 22% back in 2002.

The data measures the industrial, commercial, and residential waste streams of paper, plastic, glass, metals, textiles, organics (food), electronics, white goods such as fridges and appliances, and construction, renovation and demolition (CRD) materials like wood, drywall, doors, windows, and wiring. It excludes materials from land clearing and asphalt, concrete, bricks, and clean sand or gravel.

The only “good” news here is that the data, we believe, substantially understates the recycling that is going on in this country because it doesn’t include tonnages from provincial deposit/refund programs or the mostly paper materials that go from a retailer, say, direct to a paper recycling mill, rather than through a waste hauler or local government. Canada’s recycling success story (up 36% since 2002) will be the subject of a future blog.

In the meantime, we get to dwell on the bad news. As noted in our previous blog on this subject, Nova Scotia (and to a lesser extent British Columbia) are way out in front of everyone else. The diversion rates for New Brunswick, Alberta, Manitoba and Newfoundland and Labrador have declined over the last 12 years.

Waste Diversion by Province

John Mullinder

No Comments

Categories : Recyclable, Waste Diversion

Tags : environmental, landfill, waste diversion, Zero Waste

The good, the bad, and the ugly about Ontario’s Blue Box

Posted by John Mullinder

· January 31, 2017

· 2 Comments

The good news is that the reported recovery rates for almost every single material category in Ontario’s Blue Box have improved over the last 13 years, some by as much as 20 The Uglier Truth percentage points. The bad news is that several categories have made very little progress and lag way behind the others, and that the real recovery rates are much lower than those reported.

Here is our Report Card by material group, based on the latest recovery numbers from Stewardship Ontario. Please note that this is not a judgement on the merits of individual materials but rather an assessment of how well they are being recovered in Ontario’s Blue Box system. There is clearly room for improvement.

PRINTED PAPER

Printed paper has been a consistent good performer, rising from 67% reported recovery back in 2003 to 82% today (2015). The recovery rate for old newspapers and old telephone books is in the 90s. Somewhat further back, and dragging the printed paper category down, is the recovery rate for printing and writing paper (Other Printed). This has ranged from 39% up to 59% and is currently at 55 per cent.

GLASS PACKAGING

B+

The reported recovery rate for clear and coloured glass is an impressive 80 per cent. Years ago, all we heard about was glass going to landfill or being used as road fill. Beyond talk of glass breaking in the collection process and contaminating loads of other materials, however, glass recovery is apparently in good shape. A lot of recovered glass these days goes into blast and filter media rather than higher end uses such as fibreglass and cullet which have more demanding quality requirements.

PAPER PACKAGING

Old corrugated containers (OCC) or boxes have the highest reported recovery rate of all Blue Box materials (98%). From there it’s a drop back to paper-based gable top cartons which have surged from a 10% to a 61% recovery rate; boxboard at 43%; followed by aseptic cartons (made of paper, plastic and aluminum), and laminants. The relatively low recovery rate for old boxboard is a concern. It reached as high as 65% recovery in 2008 but has dropped back to 43% since. Stewardship Ontario did target boxboard toothpaste cartons, toilet paper roll tubes, tissue boxes and other toiletry packaging in an advertising campaign in 2015.

STEEL PACKAGING

The latest reported recovery rate for steel food and beverage cans is a respectable 71 per cent. Other steel packaging such as aerosols and paint cans drag the overall steel category down 10 per cent. In fact, paint cans are the only category in the Blue Box whose recovery rate has declined over the last 13 years.

ALUMINUM PACKAGING

The low reported recovery rate for aluminum food and beverage cans in Ontario (42%) has always been a bit of a puzzler and is frequently compared unfavourably with its far higher recovery rates in Canada’s many deposit provinces where recovery ranges between 61% and 97 per cent. One reason offered for the difference is that the recovery rate for cans in Ontario is only for those that end up in the home. It doesn’t include those used at public events, in offices, or factories. The aluminum stewards also reported residential sales some 13% lower in 2015 than what various waste audits used to provide a provincial total suggested was in the home. But even if you allow for this difference, the reported recovery rate only rises to 48 per cent. We doubt that Blue Box scavengers are grabbing the other 52 per cent.

PLASTICS PACKAGING

The reported recovery rate for plastics packaging reached 32% in 2015. The highest rate was for PET bottles (66%) and the biggest increase over the years was turned in by the “Other Plastics” category with one-third now being reported as recovered. Apart from PET and HDPE bottles, however, the plastic recovery rates are poor.

The far uglier truth about all reported Ontario Blue Box recovery rates, however, is that they don’t tell the real story. They are basically “sent for recycling numbers,” in most cases, what was sent to an end-market from a material recycling facility or MRF. These reported “recovery” rates don’t deduct the various yield losses that occur in remanufacturing that curbside material back into new products, or the contamination that must be removed (and is normally landfilled) before remanufacturing can actually take place.

For example, all reported paper numbers need to be shaved by at least 10% because paper fibres shrink in the re-pulping process. When a municipality sends 100 tonnes of paper to a paper recycling mill, only 90% of it will come out the other end. And with single-stream collection there is a lot more plastic, glass and metal contamination in the paper bales. This is usually sent to landfill. And you can chop maybe 30% off the reported PET bottle “recovery” rate since PET yields at the end-market range, at best, between 60 and 70 per cent.

A recent attempt by the Canadian Standards Association to grapple with this issue and come up with a definition of recycling, falls short in our view, and is one of the reasons why PPEC is developing a more accurate and real measurement of what paper materials are actually being recycled in this province.

P.S. In our last blog on the Blue Box, we claimed that “over 75%” of what the Ontario Blue Box collected in 2015 was paper of one kind or another. The “alternative fact” is 74.55%. Close but not correct. Sorry!

Reported Recovery Rates

Source: PPEC Analysis of Stewardship Ontario Blue Box data between 2003 and 2015

John Mullinder

2 Comments

Categories : Blue Box, Uncategorized

Tags : Blue Box, environmental, greenwashing, labelling

False and misleading claims removed from IFCO website

Posted by John Mullinder

· January 13, 2015

· 1 Comment

The North American paper packaging industry has served notice that it will challenge (legally, if necessary) any false and misleading claims about its operations and environmental impact. Case in point: major plastic crate supplier, IFCO.

IFCO is lobbying North American grocery retailers to move away from the traditional corrugated box system of delivering fruit and vegetables. In the course of promoting its plastic crate alternative, IFCO has made various economic and environmental claims. This is its right. But IFCO (and others) also have a responsibility to be able to substantiate any such public claims when challenged.

Among the most pernicious of IFCO’s recent claims were that “most (corrugated) boxes” were disposed of in landfills, and that only “a small percentage of used boxes (were) recycled.” These claims were so patently false (certainly to the corrugated industry) that for a while they served as a great example of IFCO’s lack of credibility on this issue.

Colley: Need for facts and data back-up.

But now the kid gloves have come off. The US-based Fibre Box Association recently sent a “cease and desist” letter to IFCO demanding documentation to substantiate its claims, or removal of them from the IFCO website. Within 24 hours of IFCO receiving the letter, the untrue statements had been removed. “Let’s use this (example) as a reminder,” said FBA President/CEO Dennis Colley, “to be fact-based; to have data to back up our claims; and to challenge those who don’t.”⁽¹⁾FBA Forces IFCO Website Change, Board Converting News, December 22, 2014

For the record, some 89% of US corrugated boxes were recovered for recycling in the most recent data year. ⁽²⁾US EPA Municipal Waste Characterisation tables, 2013. PPEC estimates the Canadian rate at about 85 per cent.⁽³⁾The most recent national recycling statistics for packaging materials in Canada are now 18 years old! In 1996, Statistics Canada estimated corrugated recovery at 76%. PPEC estimates this has improved since then, partly because of increased residential recovery efforts. The recovery rate for corrugated in Ontario’s Blue Box program, for example, was 85% in 2012. In both countries, most grocery stores recover nearly all of their corrugated boxes in backroom balers. The baled material is then sold to generate revenue before being recycled back into new corrugated boxes.⁽⁴⁾“When we divert cardboard, not only do we reduce the cost and the environmental consequences of sending it to landfill, it’s all recycled and turned into revenue for us.” – Loblaw Green Team member quoted in Canadian Grocer magazine. PPEC estimates that Canadian retailers received over $50 million in revenue for their old corrugated boxes last year.

John Mullinder

References[+]

References
↑1	FBA Forces IFCO Website Change, Board Converting News, December 22, 2014
↑2	US EPA Municipal Waste Characterisation tables, 2013.
↑3	The most recent national recycling statistics for packaging materials in Canada are now 18 years old! In 1996, Statistics Canada estimated corrugated recovery at 76%. PPEC estimates this has improved since then, partly because of increased residential recovery efforts. The recovery rate for corrugated in Ontario’s Blue Box program, for example, was 85% in 2012.
↑4	“When we divert cardboard, not only do we reduce the cost and the environmental consequences of sending it to landfill, it’s all recycled and turned into revenue for us.” – Loblaw Green Team member quoted in Canadian Grocer magazine. PPEC estimates that Canadian retailers received over $50 million in revenue for their old corrugated boxes last year.

1 Comment

Categories : Uncategorized

Tags : Blue Box, Dennis Colley, environmental, Fibre Box Association, greenwashing, IFCO, labelling, misleading claims

More than a thousand new tree seedlings are planted every minute in Canada

Posted by John Mullinder

· May 13, 2014

· No Comments

John Mullinder, Executive Director

In the time it takes you to read this sentence, 169 new tree seedlings will have been planted somewhere in a commercial forest in Canada. By the time you get to the bottom of the page that number will have jumped to over 2500. On average, more than a thousand seedlings are launched on a new life every minute, regenerating what Canada has plenty of — forests. The latest annual harvest for timber and pulp and paper amounted to less than 0.2% of what’s out there[1].

Average number of new seedlings planted per minute

Forest companies regenerate the forest they use because of self-interest (they want it to be there when they need it in future), but also because over 90% of Canada’s commercial forests are located on crown land, owned by the provinces. By law, these companies must meet provincially-set sustainability levels. At the moment, timber is being harvested at rates 30% below what’s considered to be the sustainable limit for Canada’s wood supply[2]. The Canadian forest industry is also a world leader in both independent third-party certification of forests and chain-of-custody certification (responsible sourcing of its raw materials)[3]. This environmental indicator is endorsed by the global alliance of retailers and consumer goods companies, The Consumer Goods Forum[4].

What’s this got to do with paper packaging? Canada’s paper packagers are by no means the major “consumers” of the forest (bugs and insects chomp their way through 14 times as much as the whole lumber and pulp and paper industries combined, forest fires almost four times as much)[5]. And, in fact, most of the boxes and cartons manufactured in Canada are made from 100% recycled fibre collected from the back of factories and supermarkets, or from curbside. But public perception always seems to come back to the tree, and to our collective stewardship of it. We don’t have a problem with this, because we can prove that Canada’s forest industry has done, and is doing, a pretty good job.

It does make us wonder, though, why more attention is not being paid by our customers and governments to the stewardship of the non-renewable resources used by our packaging competitors, who don’t seem to have any qualms about throwing mud at us, an industry that’s founded on resources that are actually renewable. Where are their independent third-party certifications of the resources they use? Where are their chain-of-custody certifications?

The major retailers and consumer packaged goods companies are loud advocates of the principle of a level playing field between themselves and between importers of packaging when it comes to extended producer responsibility or EPR schemes; and are adept at arguing for the principle of a level playing field (no cross-subsidisation in the funding fee formulas) between packaging materials. Many of these same level playing field advocates have endorsed and insisted that their paper suppliers meet independent third-party forest certification and chain-of-custody standards.

So where’s their action (not words) on developing similar independent third-party certification and chain-of-custody requirements for the extraction of non-renewable oil and natural gas deposits, for example? Don’t we have a right to a level playing field too?

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

[1] Planting of tree seedlings per minute derived from over 500 million planted per year; Canada’s harvest area (0.2%) from The State of Canada’s Forests, Annual Report 2013, Natural Resources Canada, pages 11 and 19.

[2] Ibid., page 11

[3] Ibid., page 4. Some 38% of the world’s total certified forests are in Canada. Also see PPEC press release on its members’ Chain-of-Custody certification here.

[4] Consumer Goods Forum, Global Protocol on Packaging Sustainability.

[5] The State of Canada’s Forests, ibid., page 45. Harvest area 0.6 million hectares; Fire burned 1.9 million hectares: Defoliated by insects and beetle-killed trees 9.2 million hectares.

John Mullinder

No Comments

Categories : Uncategorized

Tags : environmental, labelling, seedlings, state of Canada's forests, trees

Archive for environmental

Article Overlooks the Importance of Recycled Content

Rachel Kagan

Statistics Canada’s New Waste Management Survey Results: Paper Represents 35% of Diversion

Rachel Kagan

Little Green Lies: Q&A with Author John Mullinder

Rachel Kagan

Recycled content must be recognised in setting circular economy targets

John Mullinder

Circular Economy or spinning our wheels?

John Mullinder

China doesn’t want the world’s garbage any more

John Mullinder

Canada diverting only 27% of its waste

John Mullinder

The good, the bad, and the ugly about Ontario’s Blue Box

John Mullinder

False and misleading claims removed from IFCO website

John Mullinder

More than a thousand new tree seedlings are planted every minute in Canada

John Mullinder

RECENT POSTS

SEARCH OUR SITE

CONTACT US

Archive for environmental

RECENT POSTS

SEARCH OUR SITE

CONTACT US

Follow us!